Category: Romania

France has made adequate fiscal consolidation efforts to exit the EU’s excessive deficit procedure, the EU Council recently agreed, while calling on Hungary and Romania to adopt tax or expenditure measures to shore up their finances. The findings came alongside the release of “country specific recommendations” for each of the...

Romania will be able to count less on the low taxation advantage in order to attract investments due to growing competition, after eight EU member states have reduced their corporate tax rates since 2017, according to a study released by Deloitte Romania. “Even in the new context, the Romanian corporate...

Recently, ANAF announced the introduction of new Split VAT rules, At the same time, though, the tax authority made changes[i] to the procedural tax law which have largely been overlooked in the intense debate over Split VAT. But unnoticed or not, these changes are important for businesses in Romania. Four...

Romanian prosecutors of the Anti-Organized Crime Directorate (DIICOT), the Bacau office, carried out searches in Bucharest and six counties last Friday, in a tax evasion case with a damage of over RON 9 million (EUR 1.9 million), which involves the legal representative of Lukoil Romania. The defendants allegedly built four...

Romanians who leave the country for more than six months need to fill in a form at the Tax Agency (ANAF) starting January 1 next year. Otherwise they will receive fines ranging between RON 50-100 (EUR 11-22), according to the Finance Ministry. The obligation to notify the authorities on leaving...

The government is looking to implement EU Directives on tax avoidance, and is set to receive more financial information from multinational groups active in Romania. Tax experts suggest that large corporations might reassess their business models in order to meet the demands of the fiscal authorities in Romania and across...

Representatives of most multinational companies believe that there is a radical global change in both tax and tax control. Accordingly, the global tax model is undergoing a process of alignment with other principles, and the approach of the tax authorities during controls becomes stricter, a survey by Deloitte published in...

Noting a substantial drop in the tax burden in Romania, the International Monetary Fund has called on lawmakers to avoid further tax cuts. The IMF said that successive tax burden-cutting measures, impacting value-added tax (VAT), fuel excises, and health contributions had resulted in a drop in revenue worth nearly 2.5...

Romania approved legislation to join the OECD’s base erosion and profit shifting Inclusive Framework on March 2. As an Associate member under the Inclusive Framework, Romania will work on an equal footing with other associates and G-20 and OECD countries in the development of further BEPS standards and the peer...

The new 9 percent flat corporate profit tax – to be introduced 1st of January 2017 – will put Hungary in a very good position in the international race for investments as Hungary will offer even better conditions than Ireland and Cyprus, which are both often regarded as the European...

Romania’s National Tax Agency (ANAF) may drop the criminal charges for damages of up to RON 50,000 (EUR 11,000) from tax evasion if the accused pays the amount and penalties before the first court hearing, according to Finance Minister Anca Dragu. The taxpayers will be able to benefit from this...

Romania plans to join the Base erosion and profit shifting (BEPS) program as an associate member. The program equips governments with domestic and international instruments to address tax avoidance. The program’s objective is to have profits taxed where economic activities generating the profits are performed. The Finance Ministry has published...

Uzbekistan and Romania have signed a protocol on making amendments to the convention on avoidance of double taxation and prevention of fiscal evasion with respect to taxes on income and capital, Uzbekistan’s State Tax Committee told Trend. In accordance with this document, it is envisaged to include new provisions meeting...

The seeds of Canadian corporations hiding billions of dollars in offshore tax havens were sown more than 40 years ago, after the Canadian government pursued a series of tax treaties with tiny Caribbean and European nations. The 92 tax treaties now signed with countries such as Barbados, Jamaica and Malta...

Similar trade agreements have been used to facilitate apparent tax avoidance in the past A controversial new trade deal between the EU and the United States could make it more difficult to fight tax avoidance, a new report has warned. TTIP, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, is expected to...

Things just keep getting worse for Gene the Taxi King. A federal judge ruled Tuesday that New York taxi mogul Evgeny “Gene” Freidman illegally transferred more than $60 million in real estate assets into offshore trusts as a means of evading ex-lender Citibank. The ruling, which cited “numerous and glaring”...

On 22 December 2014, the Italian Parliament approved the Budget for 2015.40 Among other measures, the Law introduces the possibility of an exemption from corporate income tax (IRES, generally levied at 27,5%) and local tax (IRAP, generally levied at 3,9%) on income derived from qualifying intangible assets (such as patents,...

Taxpayers in Romania and throughout the world can expect to pay more tax in the years ahead as governments expand their tax systems to repay debt and pay for increased social welfare, and international efforts to update tax legislation for the 21st century take hold. These are the conclusions of...

The blacklisting saga did not start with Spain, but it did end with a timely correction related to it. Harbour Times explains how Hong Kong was taken off the Spanish tax haven list. Friends of Harbour Times would be familiar with the remedy of Hong Kong being named a non-cooperative...

On 18 November 2015, Hong Kong and Romania signed an Income Tax Treaty. The treaty will come into force after the two countries exchange ratification instruments. The provisions of the treaty will have effect from 1 January of the calendar year next following that in which the agreement enters into...

Officials from the ministries of finance and economy of five CEE countries (Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia) have called for a joint approach to combat VAT fraud and increase VAT collection in a conference hosted by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) in Budapest on Thursday. According to the EU Commission data,...

Hong Kong (HKSAR) – The Financial Secretary, Mr John C Tsang, on behalf of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, today (November 18), signed in Bucharest an agreement on the avoidance of double taxation with Romania. Romania’s State Secretary for Public Finance, Mr Attila Gy?rgy, signed on...

Hong Kong (HKSAR) – The Financial Secretary, Mr John C Tsang, arrived at Bucharest, Romania today (November 17, Bucharest time), for his two-day visit to strengthen economic and trade ties between Hong Kong and Romania. Mr Tsang first held a meeting with the Representatives of the Romanian Banking Association. Mr...

The Isle of Man has signed a Tax Information Exchange Agreement (TIEA) with Romania. The TIEA was signed during a ceremony in London on 4 November 2015, by His Excellency Mihnea Ioan Motoc, Romania Ambassador in London and Eddie Teare MHK, the Isle of Man’s Treasury Minister. Mr Teare said:...

Sixteen peer review reports were released at the recent plenary meeting of the OECD Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes on October 29-30, 2015. The release of the reports follows reviews of those territories’ legislation for the exchange of tax information and their frameworks for...

Major implementation milestones are being met by members of the world’s leading forum on tax transparency as the international community continues to move ahead towards greater tax transparency. The imminent shift to the automatic exchange of information will send a strong warning to tax evaders. Significant strides towards a major...

A company controlled by Mayor of Belgrade Sinisa Mali and his family obtained more than 10 hectares of agricultural land worth anywhere from €123,000 to € 250,000 (US$140,000 to US$290,000) for free from a privatized state company. Problem is, the land wasn’t the company’s to give, but was still owned...

The European Commission and the World Bank urged Romania on Monday to push ahead in its anti-corruption crackdown by recovering stolen assets following court convictions. Corruption in Romania has deterred foreign investors, while tax evasion and bribery put a further strain on the public finances. Anti-corruption prosecutors have launched investigations...

Bangladesh is set to sign an agreement with Bhutan to avoid double taxation to boost investments, trade and facilitate information exchange between the two Saarc nations, the National Board of Revenue said in a statement. A team led by NBR Chairman Md Nojibur Rahman is now in Thimpu to take...

Sofia. Bulgarian parliament ratified an agreement between Bulgaria and Romania on the double taxation avoidance and prevention of tax concealing, inked in April 2015. The current agreement between the countries was signed in 1994 and does not meet the economic relations between the countries. The new one offers a system...

Tax Commissioner Pierre Moscovici has urged European Union (EU) member states to “take the steps needed to fight tax evasion and tax fraud,” after new figures showed that the value-added tax (VAT) gap did not narrow in 2013. According to a new Commission report, the total amount of VAT lost...

Whatever one thinks of Europe’s ruling class, one thing is undeniable: it has chutzpah. Like a gambler who has lost his savings on roulette and decides to bet his house in hope that his luck will turn, the EU leadership is upping the ante in the destructive pursuit of an...

A Romanian court has rejected an appeal by the general manager and six executives of a subsidiary of Russian oil company Lukoil who have been indicted on tax evasion and money laundering charges. The Court of Appeal in Ploiesti dismissed the appeal made by general manager Andrey Bogdanov, a Russian...

Romanian prosecutors have completed its investigations into the alleged fraud committed at a local Lukoil refinery and on August 4 indicted the Russian-owned Petrotel refinery, its Russian director-general and five other officials. Prosecutors estimate the losses to the state at RON 7.6bn (€1.76bn), and have seized shares and bank accounts...

Italy has been dealt another scandalous blow with the arrest of 51 people in connection with tax evasion related to funds earned from online gambling. The online gambling tax evasion operation is said to be valued at € 2 billion. Executive Mario Gennaro and his associate Domenico Lagrotteria along with...

Sofia. Bulgarian government approved the agreement between Bulgaria and Romania on the double taxation avoidance and prevention of tax concealing, inked in April 2015, the press office of the Bulgarian Council of Ministers announced. The document is filed for ratification by the parliament. The current agreement between the countries was...

Romanian prosecutors seized assets of Russian oil firm Lukoil worth up to 2 billion euros ($2.22 billion) in an investigation on suspicion of money laundering, a local court was quoted as saying on Wednesday by state agency Agerpres. In October of last year Romanian prosecutors, police and customs inspectors raided...

ARBADOS’ CONTROVERSIAL BLACKLISTING by a group of European Union (EU) countries is “hypocritical” and “grossly discriminatory”, says outgoing Barbados International Business Association (BIBA) president Connie Smith. But Smith also thinks the time is right for “engaging in bilateral discussions which could hopefully conclude in double taxation agreements and bilateral investment...

“THE decision by a group of European Union (EU) Member States to blacklist Barbados as being non-cooperative and further claim that Barbados and 29 other countries, mostly small islands, do not meet its standards of transparency, exchange of information and fair tax competition, is hypocritical and on the face of...

Romania’s Directorate for Investigation of Organized Crime and Terrorism (DIICOT) prosecutors carried out searches at the Red Dragon, China Town, Sam Expo and Smart Expo shopping centers on Friday last week, following notifications from the Tax Authority ANAF. They found 70 companies that have damaged the state budget by over...

Qatar’s Emir, HH Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, ratified a draft agreement on avoidance of double taxation and prevention of fiscal evasion with respect to taxes on income between Qatar and South Africa as well as its attached draft protocol, which were signed in Pretoria on March 6, 2015....

Romania loses EUR 502 every second, EUR 30,000 every minute, and some EUR 16 billion every year because of tax evasion, said Mihai Daraban, President of Romania’s Chamber of Commerce and Industry. “This represents about 70% of the tax evasion which state institutions, NGOs or the Fiscal Council calculated. In...

FATCA – Which Countries Are In And Out The controversial US Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) law is set to start from July 1, 2014, so with less than 21 days to go, here’s a look at which countries are in and who is outside of the tax network....

The U.S. Model Income Tax Treaty (the U.S. Model Treaty) generally represents the United States’ opening position in treaty negotiations. As a result, when changes to the treaty are proposed, international tax practitioners should be aware of the potential impact those changes can have on their existing inbound U.S. structures....

Prime minister says he has proof he is innocent of charges of money laundering and tax evasion while president calls for his resignation Victor Ponta, Romania’s prime minister, said on Tuesday that he was prepared to go to court to answer charges of money-laundering, forgery and tax evasion as the...

Romanian businessman Florian Walter, who fled the country after local prosecutors charged him with tax evasion, was located abroad, and authorities have asked for his extradition, reports local Agerpres. The Prahova Court declared Florian Walter internationally wanted, after previously issuing an arrest warrant on his name. Romanian authorities, which have...

Romanian Prime Minister Vctor Ponta exits the anti-corruption prosecutor’s office in Bucharest, Romania, Friday, June 5, 2015. Ponta told media that he was suspected of making false statements, money laundering and being an accomplice to tax evasion while working as a lawyer from 2007 to 2008 when he was also...

A report from the Foreign Investors Council of Romania has proposed additional tax policy reforms to build on recent progress made towards a more equitable and transparent tax system. The FIC wants to see closer consultation between the tax authority (ANAF) and business representatives, with more time allowed for stakeholders...